


Circles and Cycles

by delicate_mageflower



Series: It Means Tumult Universe [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Awkward Flirting, Bipolar Disorder, First Meeting, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Kinloch Hold, M/M, Modern Thedas, Mutual Pining, Neurodivergent Charater(s), Pre-Relationship, institutionalization
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-21
Updated: 2016-06-21
Packaged: 2018-07-16 07:32:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7258300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/delicate_mageflower/pseuds/delicate_mageflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anders is returned to Kinloch, and he finds that his new roommate is not at all what he could have expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Circles and Cycles

**Author's Note:**

> CW: abuse, implied hypersexuality, dissociation, suicidal thoughts, self-doubt

Anders, along with his fresh black eye and what he could only assume were a few bruised ribs, was hauled into his new room in Kinloch Hold.

He’d been dragged back, literally kicking and screaming, after being gone for a good few weeks that time. He was getting better at his escapes, managing to stay on the run for longer periods each time he tried, but he had still been caught again, despondent as they forcibly brought him to his new bed, which he could swear felt somehow even more uncomfortable than he remembered them being.

The guards finally departed, leaving him to wallow in his shame, the unbearable depression of having to return to this Void he so despised, the living nightmare from which he feared he might never wake.

He wasn’t really there, despite his physical presence, distant in his overwhelmed state, caught somewhere between reality and some unknowable dimension beyond, floating somewhere between his body and the ceiling.

He’d have to start working on a new plan, of course. He refused to accept that he was fated to be trapped in this place until his death, which would most likely be premature given the abuses that regularly befell him. Whether it would be by his own hand or theirs, his guess was as good as any, but he had no doubt the Circle would be the end of him if he couldn’t eventually find his way out of there for good.

The further he fell away from himself, the more he could deny this was really happening again, and he curled into a ball on the bed to simply let it happen, grateful not to have to feel for at least a little while longer.

That is, until he noticed the stranger in the bed across from his awkwardly trying to get his attention. He smiled sympathetically, and it looked so beautiful on him that Anders couldn’t help but stare for a moment.

“Hello, umm, sorry,” the young man said shyly. “I just wanted to…well, I suppose I’m your new roommate. My name is Karl.”

“Anders,” he answered, still barely even aware of the fact that he was speaking, the sound of his own voice a strange echo from somewhere else.

“Yes,” Karl laughed, much to Anders’s surprise. “I know. I think _everyone_ on this floor knows your name by now. It’s always fun to overhear the guards fighting with the administration over how you managed to slip past them again. How many are you up to now, anyway?”

“Six?” Anders shrugged. “Seven? I don’t know, does it even fucking matter at this point?”

“Of course it does,” Karl answered sincerely, and when Anders glanced up at him again he saw that his eyes were filled with admiration. “I mean, if you can manage to get out like you _do,_ then…”

“I always come back, though, don’t I?” Anders had been rendered thoroughly unable to disguise the bitterness behind his words, and he wasn’t sure how much he cared. He liked Karl so far, though. It looked like he was going to have someone he could actually talk to for once, which made the entire ordeal sit a little better with him, as much as it could.

“Still,” Karl said with another small smile. “The fact that you’ve done it at all is fucking _extraordinary._ Sorry about your eye, though. That looks like it hurts.”

Anders couldn’t deny that the exchange was amusing, and much unlike any interaction he’d had with anyone ever before in his life. Maybe one day he’d take this man with him, but he shook his head away from the thought, clearly jumping the gun.

“Eh,” he replied flatly. “I don’t have a concussion this time, at least, so I can’t claim all the failures of the day. Suck on _that_ …fucking assholes.”

Karl laughed far more genuinely at that. “Are you sure? I mean, did they actually let someone check you over?”

“Maker, no,” Anders laughed himself, although there was no mirth to it, no humour whatsoever. “I’ve just studied enough to know the signs. Well, that and the whole first-hand experience thing…”

“Oh, are you majoring in medicine?” Karl’s eyes almost appeared to sparkle as he looked at Anders, his interest sincere.

Anders knew the rush of feeling overtaking him had little to do with Karl in reality, knew it was more a result of his fragile state, or possibly even of the way his emotions were always so much, so hard and powerful, so strong in whatever direction they went whenever they did come. They said that was part of his problem, they called it bipolar. To be fair, however, he’d read into it enough on his own by then to know even they might be right about that one.

“Yes,” he nodded. “For whatever _that_ might ever be worth. But maybe one day I can… _fuck_ …”

It was still too raw, the desperation of the white walls around him, the stiffness of the thin mattress beneath him. This room didn’t have any windows, he noted. The last one had, for all the good it did. They were all made of bulletproof glass so thick you could hardly see out of them. If anything, this room’s lack only made it appear that much less bleak.

That, of course, and the wide-eyed man on the other side of it. Anders wondered how old he was; he guessed he had to be at least a few years his senior. Freshly 18 himself, if he remembered correctly, and showing no signs of calming down, he wondered what Karl would think if…

That was clearly a thought for another day.

“If anyone can do it, I’m betting it’s you,” Karl responded eventually...or perhaps immediately. It was too hard to tell, even if the other man’s presence was strangely grounding.

“Thanks,” he answered, and he tried to force a smile along with it.

It appeared they had, at least for a time, run out of things to say, yet Karl hadn’t taken his eyes off of him once as far as he could tell. Anders gathered that the awkward attraction he felt must have been mutual, for as dangerous an idea as that was.

It wasn’t important that Anders had only been with women before. He already knew he was attracted to people of all genders, not just those whose experiences he’d shared in. He’d certainly looked, fantasised, spent enough time thinking about the subject that he wasn’t particularly worried about acting on it. He knew he was good, too, and he’d already been around enough to have all the validation he could ever need on that account. He recalled the way Solona had approached him after his first run to a broom closet with Neri, and it had only escalated from there.

This still felt different somehow, though. Anders instantly wanted those things with Karl, yes, but he wanted more than that, too. He told himself it was the illness talking, making him want things he knew he could never have with someone he’d only just met simply so he could be let down later, simply to give himself something to lose.

All the same, no one had ever looked at him like that before. Most of the other residents hardly spoke to him at all, as though just being in his very presence would bring them the kind of trouble that always followed him. He got plenty of positive attention through his constant trysts, but those ended when they ended and that was that, and no one thought any more of it. They couldn’t, and that was fine.

Karl, though, offered conversation, even encouragement. An attraction in the Circle couldn’t move beyond “we have five minutes until the staff comes back this way” and everyone knew it, and Anders reminded himself, fully aware of where his mind was taking him, how unrealistic it was.

It had to be the illness talking.

At the same time, Karl already believed in him. Karl already supported him. That infamy he carried had found him where he slept, and for the first time in his life that meant something good. Maybe one day he would figure it all out, rework his plans, get out for good, and manage not to have to do it alone.

“You alright, Anders?”

He blinked towards Karl, lost in thought, and elected not to think about how long the pause had lasted that time.

“Sorry,” Karl continued. “Of course you’re not, I...is there anything I can do? That’s not too forward of me, is it?”

“No one has ever asked me that before,” Anders answered without even thinking. “No, umm, you’re fine and...no, I’m not sure there is right now. Thanks, though. Really.”

“Well,” Karl replied with a smile, “you know where to find me if that changes.”

Eventually routine took over as the nightly rounds of medications were doled out. Anders couldn’t even remember what he was on anymore, and he bitterly swallowed down his dosage and fought back the urge to bite the nurse when he checked Anders’s tongue to make sure he actually did. Whatever Karl took seemed to do at least something for him, as it wasn’t too long after the nurse left that he fell asleep, and Anders found himself missing having him to talk to already.

He turned over to face the wall and curled in on himself as tightly as he could, and he wrapped his own arms across his chest, his hands gripping his shoulders, and how greatly he failed at trying to not think about Karl holding him like that was oddly soothing.


End file.
